Church of the Poison Mind
by I.C. Weener
Summary: You've got me burning in the third degree.


" _You blew up my car. I really loved that car."_

" _Sorry to hear about that."_

\- Viper

* * *

Time had run out for Sailor Pluto. The hour of her unmaking was at hand. She was the kind of lady you could really sink your teeth into.

The Space-Time Gate was being invaded by strange alien beings who apparently didn't think much of the rules of space-time. The normally sparkling pearl white archway was swarming with nebulous shadowy forms that vaguely resembled giant bats. Setsuna defensively stepped back from the door holding her key-staff in both hands. Her grip was steady, but her eyes gave away the fear she was trying to hide. She had never seen anything like this in any of her immortal years.

The indistinguishable alien shapes sprang off of the gateway and toward Pluto in quick black streaks. She tried to fight them off by using her Dead Scream spell, but her enemies were deaf to anything but evil and malice. They could withstand her strongest magic without even trying to dodge. They struck her staff out of her grasp and left her stumbling out of balance as they rapidly swept past her.

These defilers of time and space weaved their dark powers together to make a spell sign of a clock appear under Pluto's feet. The lone Sailor Guardian suddenly found herself stuck in place with cross-shaped minute and hour hands slowly ticking in a circle around her heels. Giant pocket watch chains lashed up through the magic circle and locked her wrists at her sides, leaving her frustrated and at the mercy of the shadow beings.

The shadows clustered so closely around her that they became like a single cloud of darkness. A set of misty black claws lashed at her neck and tore off her choker with brute force. Several more hands grasped the scarf on her shoulders and combined their strength to rip her costume in half down the middle, causing the tattered fabric of her white leotard to unravel down her torso and hang in tatters at her waist band. It was quite the small fuku folly that left her twice exposed to the nipply weather around the Space-Time Gate.

Pluto saw something gleam white in the corner of her eye. A pair of fangs protruded from the faceless darkness and sprang toward the Sailor Guardian's undressed neck. The fangs found their mark with ease, while Pluto's voice found the ability to utter a sharp involuntary gasp.

Chains rattled weakly and the hands of a clock ticked in an almost hypnotic drone as the shadow drank away at Sailor Pluto's font of lifeblood. Her struggling and her yelps of discomfort grew silent as her whole body became limp. The clustered shadows kept her on her feet as her energy faded.

The feasting ended when the shadow-beast had filled its shadow-belly with Pluto's hot red liquid core. The shapeless form pulled its fangs away to reveal the Sailor Guardian was lingering in deathly sleep and sported two small kiss marks on her throat.

The shadow forms disappeared into a unified wisp of smoke, taking their trophy prey with them.

* * *

Setsuna had nothing to wax poetic about. Her sleeping husk was sealed within a tall transparent candle like a fossil in crystal, or a fragile queen larva embedded in honeycomb. The top half of her Sailor Suit was still hanging down her waist in white, black, and ruby shreds. The fatal branding on her neck was dry and purple.

A pale blue flame burned several feet above Setsuna's head, gradually inching lower like sand in an hourglass as the wick burned away. She was inside only one of several hundred candles that dimly lit a room structured like a medieval chapel.

Melting beads smeared down Pluto's window, making her figure appear blurred and foggy. Her transparent prison grew warm and changed from solid to semi-liquid. The flame sitting just above her head extinguished and became a halo of dark smoke as the wick was exhausted.

Pluto's body descended as the melting candle lost its pillar shape. She became slathered under layers of smoldering wax once she was on the floor. Stirring out of her long slumber, she crawled up on her hands and knees as her energy mysteriously returned.

She wiped the plastered wax away from her face, uncovering her pulsing red eyes and grinning fanged lips. The remnants of her half-skinned Sailor Suit unwound into incorporeal threads, interweaved with the evils of the enchanted wax, and condensed back into pieces of solid clothing that did a better job at keeping her decent.

Setsuna slowly rose to her feet in the pale blue dark. She uttered a quiet satisfied purr as her new form dried.

* * *

It was five ticks from the witching hour and the sky hanging over Tokyo was bright red from the blood moon. Oh, what splendid time to bring the ship into a fresh harbor.

Sailor Moon, Sailor Chibi Moon, and the Inner Scouts gazed up with ominous trepidation toward the distant spiked shape hanging in the sky. The mothership of the Eclipse Kingdom Raiforso became more apparent as it gently hovered closer toward Earth. The cones of its rockets formed the steeples of a flying castle, with the largest rocket forming a bell tower at the front of the fortress. Its paneled architecture was designed as a fusion of high European Gothic and an unknown alien society. Giant pointed stakes made of imitation wood emerged from the base of the vessel and functioned as landing gear as it touched down in the empty street.

The Sailor Soldiers cautiously waited for whatever horrible unearthly menace would emerge from the craft. Metal balcony doors high on the castle opened and released rays of black energy that flew to the ground like a swarm of bats. The dark mass divided into five vague but separate shadows only a few yards in front of the Sailor Soldiers. The silhouette standing in the middle lifted her black hand to her shadowy mouth and laughed with a rich " _Ohohoho!_ "

Sailor Moon, Sailor Mercury, Sailor Venus, Sailor Jupiter, and Sailor Mars glanced to each other in confusion, having not even the slightest notion of what new enemy they were about to face. Sailor Chibi Moon's eyes grew wide with suspense as she recognized the voice instantly.

The lead figure took a step into the unnatural moonlight while her servants remained cloaked in shadow and mystery behind her. She was a spirited but cold-blooded woman with long midnight emerald hair tied in a bun on the back of her head. The expression she wore was equally cordial and threatening. The top of her gown consisted of a white bodice with a tall popped collar, regal puffed shoulders, and a plunging neckline that showed off her superior surface elevations. Her long ruffled skirt sprawled out like a black satin bell from her hips with curtains drawn open at the front so she could move freely in her leather thigh boots. White lacing trimmed her dark skirt and collar. Small ruby bows accented her bosom and the sides of her waist. A large bridal ribbon hung from her back and trailed the full length of her legs.

One hand held her long key-shaped staff like a shepherd's rod, while the other remained coyly tucked on her cheek in case she happened to break out into another one of her laughing fits. A black choker with a heart emblem wrapped around her neck to hide her grim past. The remnants of her old self still bled through the colorings and the small details of her extravagant dress, but she had irredeemably turned by greed, wickedness, and cosmic blight.

"This change in scenery. This atmosphere. All the food here," the woman said with delightful red eyes and devious ivory fangs. "This world offers so many wonderful things. Don't you all agree?"

Her attention was drawn toward the small pink disgracewho placed herself in front the rest of the Sailor team. Chibi Moon was stranded between horror and disbelief as she spoke out.

"What are you doing with these weirdos, Pluto? You're supposed to be looking after the Space-Time Gate! This doesn't make any sense!"

"Pluto?" the woman of Raiforso blinked. "I've never heard of such a silly name. Surely you must have me mistaken for one of your commoner friends. You shall address me as Duchess Sedah."

She shifted her shoulders to shrug away her mild feelings of insult and reorient her cleavage to perfection.

The silent moonlight expanded over the ground, putting a crimson spotlight on the indistinct figures standing behind the Duchess. With calm gestures and a slightly sarcastic voice, she introduced her four most loyal nobles with their eight burning red eyes and their eight vicious white fangs. Turqon, a handsome golden-haired space demon wearing foppish finery whose maddening lust for blood rivaled his maddening lust to be interviewed. Jaspine, a young (for a 4000-year-old) maiden with a red dress, red hair, red eyes, red hair, icy pale skin, and a habit of constantly licking the fangs poking out from her red lips while she giggled. Peridard, the humorless and bald-headed captain of the royal guard who hid half of his face behind a masked monocle. Amethira, a long and spindly woman dressed in a black funeral veil who always kept her arms crossed and an ambiguous smirk on her face.

Sedah gestured politely toward her imperial court and pointed them toward Sailor Moon's team. She spoke with a slight yawn.

"I've had enough of these Sailor Floozies. I believe it's time we clean out their clocks."

"Scrumptiouss," Jaspine said in a cheerful hiss. "Can we make more sisterss out of them?"

"Impale them, burn them, tear them into scraps, but don't _change_ them," Sedah said as she harshly shook her head. "If getting your fangs involved with their flesh is how you'd like to do it, you must drink them to absolution until their veins are barren deserts and their hearts shrivel into useless prunes. I don't want any of them getting back up once they're taken care of."

Ten beaming red eyes stared intently at the warm-blooded Earth guardians. The Sailor Soldiers stood on the defensive, struggling to overcome the haunting red gaze as they feared and doubted how strong they would be against this new threat. Duchess Sedah and the other nobles of Raiforso never had any fear or doubt that they were going to stake the flag of their kingdom into a few new planets.

The Sailor Soldiers unleashed their strongest attacks in a rainbow of magic energy. Their opponents lunged toward them in shapeless black streaks.

* * *

Usagi made for a tasty rabbit stew. She could feel her very life being viciously yanked into the corner of her neck before disappearing completely from her body. The Duchess was a light drinker and took her time bringing the leader of the Sailor team to her demise.

The remains of most of the Sailor Scouts were sprawled on the ground in varying states of fatal injury and dismemberment. Colorful miniskirts and ribbons lay in an open grave with mangled broken limbs and visible intestines. A ring of fire surrounded the arena where Earth's forces had fallen. The bright red light cast a reflection in the windows of the surrounding office buildings, but the royal members of Raiforso cast no reflection.

Moon and Mercury's weakened twitching forms the only two still standing on their feet. Peridard had his arms wrapped around Mercury from behind as he kept his lips cinched to the back of her throat and sterilized her veins as any diligent butler should.

Sedah unraveled her grip and let Sailor Moon drop to the ground like a lifeless sack once the pasta-haired pretty had been dried of all her marinara sauce. Sailor Mercury's body joined the mass grave a few seconds after that.

"A pity," Amethira sighed as she stood over the devastated Scouts. "I thought these stubborn moon children would have lasted longer."

"Don't let it bother you, Amethy. Now this blood bank is ours," Turqon chuckled with vanity as he brushed a small tangle out of his curled golden mane.

"Not quite," Sedah said cautiously. Her eyes turned to the side in vague recollection. "There's three others who still need to be corrected."

The circle of flames rose higher as they burned. The Duchess and her legion left the Sailor Soldiers without a second thought and started walking back toward their castle. Their dark silhouettes painlessly stepped through the flames before they disappeared.

* * *

 _Author's note: Pluto isn't a planet anymore. But that one cosplay KinslayeR13 did of her was kind of neat._


End file.
